Britain's first homegrown existentialist star, he failed to follow up the huge success of his 1956 book, The OutsiderFor a few dazzling months, Colin Wilson, who has died aged 82, was taken at his own valuation in his diary as "the major literary genius of our century", a writer destined to be "Plato's ideal sage and king". The phenomenal reviews and sales of his first book, The Outsider (1956), led him to be seen as a potential saviour of the human spirit, a thinker who might find a way through the spiritual nullity of the postwar years.The book remains extraordinary, more for its reach than its grasp. It was an attempt to map a single, negotiable path of mysticism from the span of recent western art and philosophy. Wilson looked for the path through case studies of the agonies and ecstasies of thinkers, artists and men of action including Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, Ernest Hemingway, Vaslav Nijinsky, Vincent van Gogh, Hermann Hesse and Lawrence of Arabia. He condensed them into a single type, "the Outsider", a questing spirit straddled between devastating experiences of nothingness and moments of the highest insight."Our life in modern society is a repetition of Van Gogh's problem," Wilson said, "the day-to-day struggle for intensity that disappears overnight, interrupted by human triviality and endless pettiness." The book was excitingly written, with a sense of revelation. The failing, which took longer to emerge, was that it oversimplified... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2013-12-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
Ava Weiss, the highly regarded, former longtime art director at Greenwillow Books, died on November 25 at the age of 95. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-12-10 05:00:00 UTC ]
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William “Bill” B. Eerdmans Jr., who led the family-owned Christian publishing house Wm. B. Eerdmans for more than 50 years, died on November 13. He was 97. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-11-17 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Don O’Connor, Macmillan’s senior field sales and national account manager for Ingram Kids, died on November 13. He was 63. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-11-17 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Mildred Hird, one of the first publishing executives to specialize in the sale of foreign rights of American books, died on November 2 at her home in New York City. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-11-03 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Tom Maschler Born 16th August 1933 Died 15th October 2020 Rogers, Coleridge & White managing director Peter Straus remembers the late, acclaimed publisher Like many of the impressive publishers to emerge after the Second World War, Tom Maschler was a Jewish émigré from Europe. He was... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-10-30 04:38:04 UTC ]
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Randy Kessler, national accounts manager at Scholastic, died unexpectedly on October 22 at the age of 50. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-10-29 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Puffin has announced the final book in Jacqueline Wilson’s and Nick Sharratt’s 30-year-partnership, The Runaway Girls. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-10-29 00:56:46 UTC ]
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Sphere will publish A Plot to Kill: A True Story of Deception, Betrayal and Murder in a Quiet English Town, from criminologist David Wilson. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-10-22 17:27:16 UTC ]
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Booker prize founder and publisher of some of the greats of 20th-century fictionTom Maschler, publisher and managing director of Jonathan Cape and the architect of the Booker prize for fiction, has died aged 87. A glamorous, perma-tanned figure with aquiline features and unruly hair, who dressed... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2020-10-16 17:49:02 UTC ]
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Children’s book editor David Gale, who shaped a distinguished roster of award-winning titles and proudly championed works of LGBTQ literature, died on October 9 following a long illness; he was 65. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-10-13 04:00:00 UTC ]
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My mother, Janet Freer, who has died aged 89, was a literary agent for science-fiction writers in the 1960s and 70s. She helped launch the careers of several young SF writers.Janet began work as a commercial artist before starting her publishing career in London around 1962. She spent several... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2020-10-11 15:38:47 UTC ]
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Author Bette Greene, known for her books honestly addressing difficult subject matter, including 'Summer of My German Soldier,' died on October 2 at age 86. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-10-11 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Science-comics writer Jim Ottaviani and artist C.M. Butzer team with the celebrated biologist Edward O. Wilson to turn 'Naturalist', his 1994 memoir, into an equally delightful and engrossing graphic work. In this 13-page excerpt Wilson, in love and recently engaged, nevertheless heads to New... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-10-07 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Wilson, previously executive director and publisher of the Feminist Press, has been named v-p and executive editor at Random House effective January 4. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-09-30 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Journalist who at the Sunday Times became the most admired newspaper editor of his generationSir Harold Evans, who has died aged 92, lived a life of two halves, almost two distinct lives. In his first life, he was the Manchester lad who grew up to be the most famous and most admired newspaper... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2020-09-24 11:55:45 UTC ]
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Irish children's author Sam McBratney, most widely known for the classic, bestselling picture book 'Guess How Much I Love You,' died on September 18; he was 77. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-09-22 04:00:00 UTC ]
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DK will to publish What Mummy Makes: Family Meal Planner in December 2020, the follow-up to What Mummy Makes: Cook Just Once for You and Your Baby by Rebecca Wilson. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-08-26 14:00:44 UTC ]
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Penguin Random House is launching a new collection of audiobooks from the Penguin Classics list this September, featuring acting stars from "Noughts + Crosses", "Sex Education" and "His Dark Materials" as narrators. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-08-10 21:44:19 UTC ]
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